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Shares in the company climbed by nearly 8 per cent to £9 during the day on the back of the results.

DMGT also confirmed plans to float the Zoopla property website in a deal that analysts said could value the company at up to £1.2billion.

Hot property: DMGT part owns Zoopla, which could be valued at £1.2billion

Zoopla, which is 52.6 per cent owned by DMGT, said it would offer at least 25 per cent of itself to financial institutions and members who pay to use the website such as estate agents and lettings companies.

DMGT finance director Stephen Daintith said the company would sell about a quarter of its holding, remaining the largest shareholder in the business.

Recruitment portal Jobsite is also to be sold in a deal with StepStone, owned by German publishing house AxelSpringer.

DMGT said that the piece-by-piece sale of its Evenbase division, which included Jobsite, Jobrapido and OilCareers, would raise about £150million in total.

Daintith said DMGT would use some of the proceeds from Zoopla and Jobsite to make acquisitions in the business-to-business arena.

‘What you’ll see is digital businesses, largely subscription-based, high quality information sets with a customer base that sees value in digital products,’ he said.

DMGT declared a half-year dividend of 6.2p, up from 5.9p at the same stage of last year.